The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries.

If we possessed a thorough knowledge of all the parts of the seed of any animal (e.g. man), we could from that alone, be reasons entirely mathematical and certain, deduce the whole conformation and figure of each of its members, and, conversely if we knew several peculiarities of this conformation, we would from those deduce the nature of its seed.

Mathematics is a more powerful instrument of knowledge than any other that has been bequeathed to us by human agency.

Before examining this more carefully and investigating its consequences, I want to dwell for a moment in the contemplation of God, to ponder His attributes in me, to see, admire, and adore the beauty of His boundless light, insofar as my clouded insight allows. Believing that the supreme happiness of the other life consists wholly of the contemplation of divine greatness, I now find that through less perfect contemplation of the same sort I can gain the greatest joy available in this life.

I am accustomed to sleep and in my dreams to imagine the same things that lunatics imagine when awake.

The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.